


Welcome To The End Of The World

by marinakaefer



Category: Welcome to Hell - All Media Types
Genre: Alive AU, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, Angst, Blood, Death in general, Emotional Roller Coaster, Eye Trauma, Feelings of Loss, Gen, Gore, I like me some scary zombies, I might have also given Lil a tiny bit of social anxiety, Minor Character Death, So much angst, Sock and Jon's relatinship is kinda ambiguous, Swearing, Vomit, Zombies, a few insults, all main characters will stay alive, and gay pining, could be friends could be lovers, don't worry it's not ALL angst, general grossness, mentions of animal death, occasional use of capslock, rated mature for very graphic depictions of violence, schrodinger's ship, so much 'hurt' and so little 'comfort', the ship only extends to Lil having a crush, zombie killing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-30
Updated: 2018-08-01
Packaged: 2019-06-18 18:23:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 22,254
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15491925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marinakaefer/pseuds/marinakaefer
Summary: - Alive AU, Zombie Apocalypse AU -"Lil didn’t understand what was going on. None of this made sense. People were running into the wrong directions, away from the path they would normally take during a fire drill. Not to mention that they didn’t usually scream. And they were neverchased.They were other students, but at the same time they weren’t. Not anymore. Their eyes were searching aimlessly, their legs carrying them forward with convulsive motions. Their arms were outstretched, searching for their prey. They were hunters, going after everyone who was still alive.And they were hungry. God, were they hungry."Lil and Jojo try to make it out alive. The world has gone to shit, but they are determined to stay alive and reunite with their families... while facing the apocalypse, zombies, unlikely new friends and the constant reminder that nothing is certain anymore.- Written for the Welcome to Hell Big Bang 2018 -





	1. The Opposite of a Good Day - Hell on Earth

**Author's Note:**

> I was fortunate enough to get the chance to work together with @fireweep and @LucaRoseLafur on instagram for this Big Bang~ Both of their amazing art will be linked in the authors notes at the end of the respective chapter so please look out for that <3

The Day began like any other morning in late may should have begun. Lil had to wake up way too early for her liking, got dressed and then grabbed her lunch before saying goodbye to her mom and dad.

When she arrived at school, she was subjected to the same old teachers and their increasingly boring speeches. All in all it seemed to be just another monotonous day in Lil’s boring and uneventful life. If she wouldn’t have had to worry about that essay Mrs Smith had burdened her with, Lil might have even wished for something interesting to happen.

Alas, she was pretty busy thinking about how to get finished with that as soon as humanly possible, so she could actually spend her free time on something more interesting. Something that didn’t make her want to space out for a few hours, instead.

Which she was already pretty good at, judging by the fact that she only had thirty more minutes left of her math class. Thirty more minutes before she could finally go to lunch.

But all of that was forgotten when the alarm started and the awfully loud siren forced reality to find its way into her brain. And suddenly, Lil was back in the classroom, a lump forming in her throat and her heart sinking into her stomach. The fire alarm.

It bounced off the walls, leaving Mr. Henderson as taken aback as the other students in the room, who exchanged some more or less pleased looks as they got up and went out into the hallway. The good news was that they were all going to miss the rest of Henderson’s terribly dull lesson on Algebra… The bad news was everything else that was about to follow. But none of them knew about that. Not yet.

 

The next thing she heard was screaming. There was screaming everywhere. Blank terror on her classmates’ faces. Panic and disbelief.

Her heart was jumping out of her chest with every beat, sweat forming on her forehead as her brain tried to understand the situation. There were people everywhere. Classmates and strangers alike. Kids she had known since kindergarten and some she couldn’t recognize at all.

They were everywhere and they were running and _screaming._

Lil didn’t understand what was going on. None of this made sense. People were running into the wrong directions, away from the path they would normally take during a fire drill. Not to mention that they didn’t usually scream. And they were never _chased_.

They were other students, but at the same time they weren’t. Not anymore. Their eyes were searching aimlessly, their legs carrying them forward with convulsive motions. Their arms were outstretched, searching for their prey. They were hunters, going after everyone who was still alive.

And they were hungry. God, were they hungry.

 

Lil hadn’t been the only one frozen in place due to shock and confusion. A boy in front of her, his name started with an S if she remembered correctly, Sean or Sam or something like that… He had been staring for a moment too long.

One of the approaching things had gotten to him before his legs had even twitched, the slender hand of a petite girl curling around his upper arm, squeezing hard, fingernails digging into his skin, through the fabric, leaving red spots on his white shirt as he started stumbling backwards, trying his best to push the girl’s face away from him. But there was no use, she just started shoving her mouth closer to his hand, her face closer to his own and-…

This was the moment in which Lil finally awoke from her trance, turned around and _ran._

 

It may have been the fire alarm which had led them out of the classrooms…

But this was no fire. You can escape fire. You can outrun it. You can survive it. You can distinguish it.

You can save yourself from the flames. But this? This wasn't fire. This was hell.

There was no way to go. At this point, they were everywhere. She didn't even think about where to run, her legs were just carrying her forward, down the corridor, further and further. Lil heard the piercing screams coming from Cheryl's throat but she didn't dare to look, let alone stop running. Her classmates were eating that girl alive. There was nothing Lil could've done to safe her.

At least that was what she kept telling herself for the next few steps she took before shoving one of those things out of the way and barely avoiding the grasp of another one. Lil couldn’t help but notice the disgustingly huge desire for flesh plastered all over their faces.

Although she didn’t have time to dwell on that thought for more than a frightening moment. She and a handful of other students had just reached the staircase leading up to the 3rd and down to the ground floor.

A girl came stumbling down the stairs into Lil’s direction. Her shoulder and neck were a bloody mess, more hole than skin and flesh. Lil didn’t wait to find out whether she was followed by another one of those things, she made her way to the stairs leading to the ground floor before she would have made that discovery.

She heard the sickening smack of the girl’s body hitting the floor, but she didn’t turn around, didn’t look. She ran down the stairs, first. When Lil reached the last step she turned her head but the girl had already begun to rise back onto her feet.

The look on her face was haunting. There was no trace of pain. Just those empty emotionless eyes, _searching_.

Lil picked up her pace again. She needed to get out of there as fast as possible.

 

The situation got even worse on the ground floor. There were more people, both dead and alive. There was more screaming, more fighting, more chaos. There were dozens of students, all trying to _get out, get out as fast as they could_. That was Lil's plan as well, to make her way to the entrance door, no matter what.

But she was foolish enough to forget (just for a moment) that the others thought the same. She had not expected to be shoved away. She only caught a glimpse of the boy who had been right behind her on their way down the staircase before her back hit the wall and she lost her balance.

She didn't manage to catch herself, already hit the floor before she knew it.

And then, _he_ noticed her. Lil could already see her life flash before her eyes when the man came for her. He used to be a teacher, still young and fairly new at her school. He was said to be one of the very ambitious kind. But now he was dead. _Dead and alive,_ both at the same time.

She still didn't want to believe it. Her mind had been trying to deny it up until that moment. But at that point, when he lunged at her, she knew it was true. There were zombies, _real zombies_ in this world. There was no denying it now. There were zombies everywhere and she was about to be eaten alive.

 

She couldn’t get up before he reached her so she shoved her boot into his face with all the force she could muster. But she didn’t even feel the tiniest bit of satisfaction as his nose caved in under her sole. The cracking noise had been an ugly one but the monster on top of her didn't seem to notice or care. Lil had managed to keep him in place with her left boot on his throat while she kept throwing her right foot right into his face, trying her best to keep him at a distance, as far away as possible. But he just kept pushing on, completely unbothered by the kicks getting closer to cracking his skull open.

He kept pushing, forcing Lil's legs to bend, slowly but surely, as his hands grabbed her legs, squeezing tightly, stinging. Her heart was racing, she couldn’t even think anymore, at this point she was just pure instinct and panic. She grabbed his wrist, tried to peel his hands off of her, get him away from her, _but there was no use._

_He had her, he had her, he had her, this was it, this was the end, this would be her death, he got closer, her eyes were burning with tears, his mouth was moving, he was trying to bite her, her legs were so weak, he got closer and closer and-…_

 

Then, all of the sudden, the weight disappeared from her legs, accompanied by a loud crack, followed by a thud.

The man was gone. _He was gone._ Now there was a girl standing in front of Lil instead. She was breathing heavily, baseball bat in hand, staring at the spot next to Lil. She could tell the girl was about her age and most certainly still alive. Her blue eyes formed a piercing stare, flashing like lightning under her baseball cap while she lifted her bat into the air and let it crash down onto the head of the monster Lil had been trying to fight off just moments ago. If the final crack of his skull was the thunder next to Lil, the small drops of blood hitting her side and arm must've been the rain.

Just then, a thunderstorm stood before her, holding out her hand after saving Lil from certain death.

“Come on, we need to get out of here!” And with that, she took Lil’s hand and pulled her up to her feet.

There really was no other option but to follow her. She had a weapon, she knew how to fight, she even killed one of those things and saved her life. Even though Lil didn’t understand the reason for the girl’s kindness she wasn’t going to question it _now_ , of all times. Because she was right. They needed to hurry up.

 

They were running towards the main entrance, away from the zombies behind them, past the distracted zombies scattered throughout the hall, and towards the big crowd of survivors who were all destined to die earlier than they could’ve ever anticipated.

Lil didn’t fully understand why they were still headed into that direction.

The main entrance was overrun with people. There was no getting out this way, the mob didn’t seem to move forward at all. Most students were pushing and shoving the others away from them in an attempt to get out faster. The thoughts running through their heads were obvious. _They still had a chance to flee and they were ready to fight for their survival by any means possible._ The zombies hadn’t quite reached them yet. But Lil was awfully aware of their presence. If she would have just turned her head and looked back she would have seen them getting closer. But she didn’t want to look. Not at all.

Instead, she was staring at the back of the blonde’s head, determined to concentrate on the baseball cap and the blue ties in her hair instead of the horrifying images and sounds all around them.

If anyone would have asked Lil why exactly she trusted her in that moment… She wouldn’t have been able to give a plausible answer to that question at all. Especially since Lil didn’t know who she was, she couldn’t recall ever talking to her before this day.

Of course she had just saved her life, but here was something else about her, something that made Lil feel a strange sense of determination. Somehow, she seemed like someone Lil could trust. Even though she couldn’t place where exactly this feeling came from. But if she had to guess… It could’ve been that look on her face. Fierce and ready to conquer hell.

 

She made a sudden turn, away from the main hall and Lil stumbled after her, almost tripping over an undead body crawling towards the main entrance.

That very thing must have made up its mind though. Lil knew its destination had changed because she could hear it dragging itself after them, heavy hands hitting the ground, pulling its torso and limb legs across the old linoleum floor.

The hallway they were currently running though turned out to be the one housing the teacher’s lounge as well as the secretary’s and principal’s offices.

There was another door at the end of it, a ray of light in the horrifying world around them. It was left wide open, a sign that they weren’t the first ones to take notice of this exit.

But just like clouds blocking out the sun on a cold day, another one of those monsters used the opportunity the door offered. The zombie slid inside through the door and their hopes were crushed. Now they had a pale, dead man approaching from that side of the hallway while the crawling one was still behind them. And it got closer with every time its hands hit the floor.

 

The girl in front of Lil stopped in her track and mumbled curses under her breath. They had nowhere to go. Going back to the main hall was no option, it was a certain death trap. There were too many of them back there. The girl looked around for half a second before running over to the door closest to them.

 

She began fumbling with a bunch of keys she pulled out of her shorts front pocket, frantically trying to shove one after the other into the keyhole of the door. Lil, on the other hand, turned towards the monsters, watching them in stunned horror as they got closer and closer.

And just then, her mind sent her back into the hallway she had just fled, fighting off the remains of the teacher she had barely known. She could still feel his nose breaking under her boot, could still feel his gross hands digging into her legs, remember the look in his eyes… It all made her feel like throwing up.

She was frozen in place. They were hardly further away than a dozen feet but she couldn’t move. Not to mention that she wouldn’t have know where to _move to_. She barely heard the soft click behind her before she got pulled into the now open room.

 

While the blonde slammed the door shut and locked it again, Lil didn’t quite feel real yet. It took a moment to realise where they had fled to. There wasn’t much to see in their new environment. The small room they had stumbled into featured a toilet and a sink, which led Lil to believe that this was the teacher's restroom. A question wriggled its way into her head, but she shook it off.

She didn’t dare to question where the fuck the girl had gotten those keys from. At the moment, she was just glad they had them. There would be a better time for explanations when her heart had stopped attempting to jump out of her chest. A time for when her thoughts didn’t tangle up into and unfathomable mess.

 

The other girl took deep breaths. “We should… wait for them to get distracted… and then make our way to the emergency exit over there...”

“Yeah that’s… that sounds like a plan.” Lil was gasping for air, too. She had barely realised what a stain the running had put on her body. Her throat was on fire, every single breath she took hurt like hell. If she didn’t knew any better she would have assumed that someone was shoving a cheese grater down her throat at the very moment.

The silence that followed was filled with anticipation. Both girls crept closer to the door, listening intently. Lil couldn't hear anything except the general noises of terror and disarray beyond the door, but that didn't mean the zombies had backed off already. Staying in the bathroom really was the next logical step. It was the closest thing to a safe space they could get inside of the school.

 

After a moment of catching her breath and gathering her thoughts, Lil dared to speak up again. There was something she wanted to say, and if she didn't do it now, she might have regretted it later. Her voice was quiet, barely rose above a whisper, but she had no other choice. Being any louder would've meant to risk drawing the zombies’ attention back to their hideout. “… Thank you.”

The blonde girl's eyes had been fixed on the door in front of them, but now they met Lil's gaze with a hint of confusion. “Huh?”

“Well… you know, for saving me.”

The girl blinked in surprise. “Yeah, uh… you're welcome?”

And while Lil was truly grateful, she couldn’t shake off this strange feeling of guilt. “But…? Why? Why did you save _me?_ ”

Her eyes widened in surprise. “I… dunno, just because I could, I guess?”

That didn’t make Lil feel any smarter. But for some unfathomable reason... it sent a smile onto her lips. “… What are you, my guardian angel?”

“… Don't be ridiculous. I'm just a girl with a baseball bat.” She barely looked offended with that crooked grin on her face. “… I’d rather be your bodyguard anyway, heard they get a better wage.”

How could that girl keep her wit in such a disastrous situation? Lil couldn’t help but snort. “Wait, are you telling me I owe you now?”

“Yeah, sure, if you insist”, she shot back with an even bigger grin. It didn’t stay on her face for too long though, a slight frown replaced it as her blue eyes focused on Lil. “There wasn’t really time for me to ask yet, but… Are you all right? Did that guy hurt you?”

“I… no I think I’m fine,” Lil didn’t even know why that took her by surprise, “Feels like I might have some bruises on my legs but… he didn’t bite me or anything, so I guess I got lucky.”

The other girl nodded and closed her eyes for a moment. “Glad to hear that.”

Lil didn’t know what to say, it just seemed so strange for this girl to worry about her even though this was their first conversation.

But again, the other girl beat her to it. She avoided eye contact this time, staring at the wall behind Lil instead.

“Hey, uhm… Before we go out there and make a run for our lives… What's your name?”

Lil raised her eyebrows. Right, names were a thing that might be important to know. The thought hadn't even crossed her mind yet.

“My name's Magill Nancy, but you can call me Lil.”

The other girl nodded and even let a hint of a smile cross her face. “Okay; Lil.” And then their eyes met again. “Sweet. I'm Jojo, or well, Joane, but no one calls me that.”

There was nothing to celebrate yet, but somehow that smile on her face was contagious. The corners of Lil’s mouth twitched upwards without any way for her to prevent it. “It’s nice to meet you, Jojo.”

 

They spend a few more moments in a silence, after their introduction had passed. It grew tense shortly after, as they listened intently to the noises behind the door. There were still screams and shouts bouncing off the hallways walls… But it sounded distant, not from right outside their hideout.

This time Lil was the first one to speak up. “It’s been a few minutes now, I think it’s as safe now as it’s gonna get.” Deep worry was still painted on both of their faces… but Jojo nodded in agreement.

“You’re right. We should get outta here. But first…” She took a deep breath before looking at Lil again. “Okay, so… I know it's gonna sound crazy, but I've got a plan.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks to fireweep who created some gorgeous art for this chapter <3 You can look at it right now, right [HERE](https://www.instagram.com/p/Bl6DuPchrto/?utm_source=ig_share_sheet&igshid=rpsbzeb01n2y)


	2. The girl with the baseball bat

It turned out that plan of hers included making their way to the teacher's parking lot, stealing Ms. Smith’s car, driving to Jojo’s place and surviving on the leftovers in her fridge.

And while there were a lot of moot points in that not so great plan, but it was their best shot. They surely couldn’t stay in the teacher's restroom forever… and Lil's apartment was pretty much in the middle of the town, which didn't strike them as the safest place… since many people were equal to ‘many possible (future) zombies’.

 

When they reached the parking lot and Jojo pulled the keychain out of her pocket again, Lil couldn't help it and finally asked her where the fuck she had gotten Smith’s keys from.

“I'll tell you when we're there!”, Jojo said while hurriedly pushing the little ‘unlock’ button on the car key in her hand. A nearby dark blue minivan came to life, and Jojo immediately headed for that very car.

Lil took a quick look around herself, assessed the situation and decided that Jojo was right. There was another dead person walking into their direction, so explanations could probably wait until they had reached a safer place than the parking lot of a school swarming with zombies.

Great unease settled in her stomach as Lil squeezed herself into the driver's seat of the unfamiliar car. Jojo handed her the keys and, internally, Lil already cursed the day she told her dad she wanted to learn how to drive.  _ Because  _ **_of course_ ** _ she had to be  _ **_the only one of the two_ ** _ to know how to  _ **_drive a fucking car_ ** _. AND SHE WASN’T EVEN PARTICULARLY GOOD AT IT, YET! _

Lil swallowed the lump forming in her throat and turned the key in the ignition. “How far do you think we're gonna get?” Her voice oozed of her anxiety.

Jojo only shrugged and looked out of the windshield. “Dunno. Far enough, I hope.”

 

That didn't manage to calm Lil down at all. Oh god, why did she even ask.

Jojo pointed into the direction they would have to take. And thus, Lil pulled out of the parking lot and began the worst car drive of her entire life.

 

***

 

“Holy shit, I can’t believe we’ve actually  _ made it _ .” The words slipped out of Lil’s mouth with a weary sigh that took all the tension that was left in her body with it… And replaced it with exhaustion. They both stumbled out of the car and onto the empty street.

That car ride had been the most nightmarish situation Lil had ever experienced. The zombies were everywhere. Well, the concentration of them had been sparse, compared to the hell her school had turned into… But that didn’t change the fact that there was now a considerably big dent in the hood of the car while the windshield was full of cracks, left behind by something that had hopefully only been one of those things.

Not that they could have avoided that situation…

Well,  _ to be fair, _ you’re not actually supposed to drive on the walkway, but the streets had been packed with vehicles. A traffic jam had started to form in front of them. Of course they weren’t the only people trying to escape the city. And of course Lil and Jojo had to get caught up in that, too. Lil had been busy cursing under her breath as their stolen car came to a halt.

She was trying to figure out how long the line of cars in front of them was. The tension in her body got worse with every second they spent with standing still and then all of the sudden Jojo had  _ screamed at her to ‘fucking drive’. _ And she did, without question.

Which led to her pulling over onto the walkway. That’s where she caught a glimpse of what had caused Jojo’s voice to fill with terror.

There was another zombie there, in front of them. At a car not far from their own.

And it had just started climbing through the remains of the passenger seats window, squeezing through a gap framed with glass shards.

That was the moment in which Jojo had yelled to  _ ‘keep driving, oh god,  _ **_keep driving_ ** _ ’ _ but Lil had never considered to stop.

Then they crashed into something; A body was sent flying over the windshield. While Lil  _ did _ scream, she didn't give in to her instinct to stomp on the brake and help whomever she had hit. There was no use, there was nothing she could do to revive the dead. And she surely didn't want to join them.

 

That wasn’t the only major event that had taken place during the car ride, but Lil didn’t really want to recall the stumbling corpses they had passed, the wrecked cars they had seen or the blood that was splattered all over the pavement. She didn’t want to remember any of that as anything more than a blur of stressful emergency turns.

 

Lil took her eyes off of the battered hood and windshield and solemnly swore to herself that she would never set another foot into a car. Ever. Again.

It was a miracle. There was no other way to view it, because it was true. There was no way they could’ve actually made it to Jojo’s house in the suburbs of the town without dying a terrible death. Lil couldn’t think of a single thing she had done in her life to gain the favor of fate itself, but surely wouldn’t complain about that now.

 

Jojo grabbed Lil’s hoodie sleeve and pulled her over to one of the almost identical looking houses. She lead her through the small and slightly neglected front yard, past dry grass and towards a white door with chipped paint on the edges.

Jojo let go of her sleeve and fished her house keys out of her pocket to open the door. “Dad, I’m home!” she announced out of habit, Lil supposed.

There was no answer. Jojo took a quick glance at Lil. It wasn’t hard to miss the way her face tensed when she motioned Lil to enter the house. 

 

They spend the next few minutes tiptoeing from room to room, but everything seemed safe and empty. They ended up staying in the living room. No one was there. Only Lil and Jojo.

Her face seemed to become more grim by the second. “Dad should be here…”, Jojo mumbled when she saw the confusion written onto Lil’s forehead. “He works from home so he rarely leaves the house. I don’t get why he  _ isn’t here _ .”

Lil couldn’t help but feel the same dread building up in the pit of her stomach. She hadn’t even thought about her own parents until then. 

Fuck. She didn’t want to think about them now. Not at all. She didn’t want to imagine what they were going through at the very moment. She would give everything for the certain knowledge that they were okay and well and hiding somewhere safe. God, she hoped they were at home.

Not that there was any way for Lil to get to them, not now. The center of the town was more than just a few blocks away. And it would have been too dangerous to go searching for them in such a public place. And she surely didn't want to step outside onto the streets again any time soon.

God, if only she could talk to them. If only she…  _ Wait. _

 

“Jojo, do you still have your phone with you?”

Confusion seeped into her tense stare, Lil’s words had pulled her out of her thoughts.

“I-...” Jojo didn’t seem to understand at first. “Yeah, it’s in my bag.”

“Well, what are you waiting for, then! You should try to call your dad!”

Her eyebrows shot up in surprise. “Shit, you’re right!”

She stumbled over to her bag, rummaged through it and talked constantly in the meantime. “I can’t believe I didn’t think of that myself! He’s always glued to his phone, he would never leave it here.”   
She found her phone by then, and finally there was some trace of hope sparkling in her eyes.

She held it next to her face, waiting with anticipation. But life is unfair and hope is such a fickle thing. Jojo knit her brows, her whole face going back to being tense while she stared holes into the wall.

“I can’t reach him. It’s not going through.”

Lil let out a shaky breath “Shit. I’m sorry.”

“... well, it’s not like it’s your fault.” Her gaze dropped to the floor, searching for answers no one could give her.

At this point, Lil couldn’t hide her anxiety anymore. “Can I… I know it’s probably useless, but… can I use your phone for a second?” She took a deep breath. “Mine is still in my locker at school, and… I want to call my parents, too.”

Jojo nodded. Her face was still stern and distant but she held out the phone for Lil. She tried to call their house phone, but she had the same problem. Nothing got through. She couldn’t even leave a message.

She handed Jojo it back without a word.

“Well, fuck. It was worth a try, but…” Jojo sighed. “Fuck.”

 

***

 

Waiting like that was pure agony, so they decided that they had to do  _ something _ . They weren’t close to the center of the city anymore and the streets seemed to be empty and safe…

But since they had seen what these zombies could do, they decided that they surely wouldn’t wait for them to find and kill them.

So here they stood, barricading the front door and every window in sight with all the furniture they could spare. Thinking about their parents had only made the situation worse. But they couldn’t relax just yet. They had seen too much to get reckless now…

 

But in the end, they ended up back in the living room. With the blinds closed, it seemed smaller than it actually was. They had no idea whether the zombies could see them or not, so they figured that was the safest way to spend the day… in the dark. That didn’t really help to lift the mood at all.

The only  _ kind of _ good thing was that they had gained some kind of idea where Jojo’s dad could have gone… But the implications weren’t too great either. It seemed like he went grocery shopping; The fridge was almost empty safe for a few appetizers and spreads. Mostly jelly and cheese.

Jojo had made a remark about how they needed to find more food, but she seemed to avoid any talk about her father from that point on. Lil didn’t want to press the matter though, she only knew too well what was going on in her head.

 

Jojo leaned against the wall in front of the couch, brows furrowed and eyes distant. And Lil kept trying to think of something, anything, they could talk about to avoid the thoughts.

That’s when she remembered that thing she asked about before they had gotten started on their car ride straight through hell.

“… So… where did you get those keys from?”

 

“Wha-?” Jojo blinked. “Oh, uh… yeah, I uhm… god, I almost forgot about that again.” She started to wring her hands, averted her gaze and stared at the floor instead. 

Lil already started to regret picking that topic of all things. She should've gone for small talk. The weather, maybe? Just… literally anything else.

Shit, that was awkward. She needed to safe the situation. “You- uhm… you don’t have to talk about it… I mean, if you don’t want to.”

“No no, you’re right, I should tell you… Don’t want you to think I have any deep dark secrets to keep, that would probably make a bad impression on you.”

Well, Lil couldn’t really argue with that. Her mind would most certainly try to fill in the blanks sooner or later and she didn't want to consider the possibility that Jojo might have straight up murdered her teacher to get those keys. Not that Lil hadn't considered it before. But she mostly just wanted Ms. Smith to stop being such a horrible teacher. Which… well, was kind of a morbid thought, now that she was… most likely a zombie.

Jojo tried to smirk, but it didn’t even reach her eyes before it disappeared again. It didn’t seem like she wanted to talk about it at all. “Well, you already know they’re Ms. Smith’s keys, so…”

She took a deep breath, then continued to talk. “Shit, it was a huge mess, ya know? I think we were the first ones to find out about all that zombie stuff.”

Jojo kept staring at her feet… And Lil continued to feel horrible about asking her to talk about it in the first place.

Another sigh escaped Jojo. “It’s just-… a lot of stuff happened back there and I… I’m not too proud of it.” Her face started to heat up, but now she actually  _ looked _ at Lil again. “I took her keys when the zombies got her. There were noises outside on the hallway and… well, you know Ms. Smith, right?”

“Yeah, she’s my English teacher.” Lil nodded before she even realised what she had just said. “…  _ was _ , I meant… ‘was’.”

Jojo’s gaze dropped back to the floor. “Well, yeah… so… she went outside to scream at the students for being outside during class. They bit her before she had finished her usual lecture about hallpasses and students abusing them or whatever. I just… God, I don’t even know  _ why _ , but I saw her keys lying on her desk, right next to her briefcase and I just grabbed them and my bag and booked it. God, I didn’t even know what was going on out there.”

In that moment, Jojo looked so small and hurt. It broke her heart. “I’m sorry to hear that. It must’ve been really scary.” Lil placed a hand on her shoulder, but Jojo kept avoiding her gaze.

“I… don’t know. I don’t even know what I was thinking at that moment. It was all… fuck, I don’t know. I just… I yelled at the others to pull the fire alarm and ran outside. Weird, huh?” A laugh escaped her, bitter and dark. “And I didn’t even get out of the school. I went to my locker instead, got my baseball bat and tried to play hero instead of saving my own damn ass. Not that it made any difference, there were too many of them and bashing their heads in was nowhere as easy or effective as it looks in the movies. They just kept multiplying and in the end I just-… I couldn’t do it anymore, there were too many people that I  _ knew _ . I saw how they were bitten and I couldn’t do anything to save them, I wasn’t nearly fast enough. I-…”

Her voice gave up and she started to blink back tears before Lil knew it and suddenly it was  _ Lil’s _ turn to feel totally helpless. She didn’t know what to do with her hands. Should she hug Jojo? Was that a thing they could do already? They barely knew each other for an hour or two, how should Lil know whether they were on a ‘hug’ basis already? She had started to move in front of Jojo, to take a look into her eyes, to tell her everything’s all right…

But she couldn’t say a word, couldn’t make a sound besides a soft, surprised gasp as Jojo wrapped her arms around her waist and pressed her face into the nape of her neck.

Lil’s breath hitched but she couldn’t place her finger on the ‘why’. Her throat was too dry, she could barely swallow, let alone talk. “I…,” she coughed, “I know what you’re talking about. It’s… I saw it, too. I saw them eating the others.”

Jojo took a deep breath, her arms still shivering around her body. “Who did they get?”

“They… Well… Cheryl. I… I knew her since kindergarten… Actually, she was kind of a bitch but like… she never really bothered me.” Lil could barely breathe. She didn’t want to think about it, didn’t want to remember it. And yet, here she was, reliving the moments right after she had left the classroom. “A guy from my math class, too. Some girl got to him before he even knew what was happening… Before  **I** even knew what was happening.”

“And then…” The thought made her flinch. “That teacher, of course.”

She took another deep breath and tried to banish the thought. “I ran by a lot of people without even thinking about it, I just tried to get out of there as fast as possible. I don't even know if they bit any more people that I knew…”

She honestly admired how selfless Jojo had been, taking a weapon into her hands and trying to protect the others instead of going for the exit. It was something she hadn't even considered at the time. And Lil told her that. She told her that she thought she had been incredibly brave, but Jojo only got more tense and scoffed.

“Brave?”, she replied, “No, I was just acting like a dumbass with a hero complex.”

But Lil had to disagree. Partly, at least. “Of course it was stupid, but that doesn't mean that it wasn't badass, too.”

She scoffed again and rolled her eyes… but another crooked smile, weak but still there, found its way onto her face. “Pfft, yeah right.”

 

They decided to talk about something else after that, something less depressing… which was difficult to do. Talking about the weather wasn’t really something they were in the mood for, after all. Talking about their favourite colors felt just as pointless.

 

“What about fave animals?” Jojo asked, without being particularly serious.

“Not gonna lie, cats are great,” Lil replied with a shrug, “they’re cuddly and cute but also independent enough to live on their own… And you can just drop them, they’ll land on their feet every time.”

Jojo nodded in agreement and added: “Yeah, I like them, too. I’m more of a dog person though…” She paused. “Do you have a cat?”

 

Lil couldn’t help but smile. “Yeah, he’s a cuddly little asshole. And he knows how to get into our kitchen cupboards. Besides, we live on the ground floor and always leave a window to the little backyard open for him, so…” Lil could see how Jojo tensed. “I’m not too worried about him, he drags dead rats and mice inside every second day. He’s gonna manage.”

Of course she had spend more than one or two seconds thinking about that furry idiot… and while she was actually a bit worried about him, he would have better chances at survival than most pets. She would definitely feel better if he was at her side, though.

 

Jojo looked rather uncomfortable at that point. “Oh that’s… that’s good to hear.” She paused again, clearly grasping for straws that were on a less awkward level. “Uhm… What’s his name?”

That question made Lil snort. “… Lawrence Meower.”

It was the best case scenario of a question. Lil was barely able to contain her proud grin. “You know, so I could get away with calling him ‘lawnmeower’ for short.”

 

That definitely caught Jojo off-guard. She began coughing violently, so much that Lil had enough time to grow worried that her new friend was about to choke to death on her own spit.

“Shit, I’m so sorry, are you okay??” Lil asked, but Jojo’s coughing turned into a breathless wheezing before she snorted and burst out into full laughter.

“Oh my god,” she said between gasping for air, “you named your cat  _ lawnmower _ ?” Her eyes were full of disbelief and silent wonder. They really did spell out ‘What the fuck is wrong with you?’.

“What kind of name  _ is that _ ?” she laughed.

 

“The best kind?” Lil shot back without missing a beat. She couldn’t help but cross her arms and put on a fake pout.

The shock in her eyes was priceless. “It’s  _ horrible _ ! I love it, but it’s horrible.”

 

“Thanks! I love it when people acknowledge how much of a naming-genius I am,” she grinned, “What about you; Do you have any pets?”

 

One or the other little chuckle still escaped Jojo, but she managed to speak clearly. “Nah, I don’t…”

She paused for a moment. “But I used to have a dog when I was younger… His name was Sparks and he was the cutest puppy ever!” Jojo’s eyes lit up. She had already been smiling brightly but her grin just got bigger and bigger with every second. Lil couldn’t fight the smile forming on her own face. Jojo’s laugh was contagious. It felt like a warm hug on a cold day. And it sounded… kinda cute, actually.

 

“He would always bring me his toys when he wanted to play… And he always kept me company in my room when I had to do stuff for school! He was the most patient dog you could  _ ever _ imagine!” She snorted again.

“Oh and… I know that sounds fake but…”, she began snickering a little, which evolved into a barely contained laugh with every word she said, “One time he actually tried to eat my geography homework! I could save it before he managed to damage it beyond repair and when I showed it to my teacher the next day she didn’t want to believe me at first but then she just… couldn’t stop laughing whenever she looked over to her desk and saw my wrinkly and torn homework.”

 

“That  _ does _ sound like a cool dog,” Lil managed to remark between her fits of giggling.

 

It took them both a few moments to calm down and catch their breath again.

 

And then, the smile on Jojo’s face started to fade within seconds. “Yeah, he… he was great,” she mumbled. Wait what? Fuck. What had happened? What was wrong, all of the sudden?

 

“He died a few years ago.” Oh. Well, that explained it.

Lil could feel the awkwardness like a cold shower. “I-... Fuck, sorry to hear that.”

 

What followed was another long moment of silence… And Lil could feel the glee and happy thoughts drain out of them, out of the room in general. It seeped out through the gaps under the doors and left behind a shiver that ran down her spine. It could have been fascinating, in a way… To watch how quickly joy could turn into utter despair.

 

Jojo sank to the floor, face buried in her hands, with her back leaned against the wall. Her shoulders were hunched over and made her look even more defeated. “Fuck, what if he’s dead, too?”, a small whimper escaped her, “What if they’re  _ all _ dead?”

Lil didn’t understand, at first. But then she remembered why they had walked through every single room of the house, why they had barricaded themselves inside of Jojo’s living room and why they had tried to call their parents even though the chances of reaching them were almost nonexistent.

 

She was worried about her dad.

Jojo had obviously tried her best to stay calm throughout their escape mission, but that must’ve been the last straw… That goddamn small talk about her long dead dog. The edge of madness was closer than Lil would have liked to admit.

She couldn’t do much more than let out a deep sigh and sit down next to her. She had been trying to avoid thinking about it, but Jojo was right. Lil knew what was going on in her mind. She couldn’t help but think about her own parents.

The situation was bad, there was no denying it. But they really couldn’t lose their hope. Not yet. They couldn’t afford it. Not so soon, not right after the beginning. 

“Maybe they’re just hiding somewhere else and waiting for their chance to get home.” She drew her legs close to her body and let her arms rest on her knees. “Or they found a safer place to stay at.”  _ There was still hope. _ Maybe she would start to believe it if she told herself a few more times.

Jojo took a deep breath, almost as if she wanted to say something… But she stayed quiet, and just kept breathing. Lil couldn’t blame her. She had been fighting with the idea herself. It would be a lucky coincidence if her mom and dad were still alive.

They both had jobs in the middle of the town. If they hadn’t found a safe place, there was no way they were still out there. But she had to stay calm now, blinking back tears. She would have to believe in her parents’ safety as long as she didn’t find their dead bodies.

 

The silence between the two girls lasted for a few more minutes before Jojo started shifting in her seat next to Lil. When she let her eyes wander into her direction, Jojo was sitting cross-legged and her hands had dropped onto her lap. And then her eyes met Lil’s and they were still filled with uncertainty. “Do you know where your parents normally are, I mean… right now?”, Jojo asked.

Lil took a deep breath before answering. Her heart was racing in her chest. “Yeah… they should be at work. My dad’s in an office and my mom works in retail.” She could tell there was no need to mention the fact that they were both in pretty risky places. Many people meant many chances to get bitten, after all. Jojo seemed to understand.

“What about yours?”, Lil asked. Jojo let her eyes wander through the room, away from Lil, not focusing on anything in particular.

“Well, I already told you that my dad works from home, he’s always glued to his computer.” Mumbling, she added: “Dunno about my mom though, haven’t seen her in a while.”

Nodding was the only response Lil came up with. The word ‘divorced’ ghosted through her head, but she decided not to ask her about it. And Jojo didn’t seem to have any desire to talk about it, either.

And again, they sat in silence. But this it didn't feel like an awkward one. It was filled with thoughts and unsaid words, pain and sadness and uncertainty. And an ever underlying determination. A mission. They needed to find their parents. They needed to find out what had happened to them. If they were okay, still alive…

They were gonna make it. Lil and Jojo, just like their parents, would make it out alive. They were going to survive, no matter what. They should try to find their families, some friends, and form a group to make survival easier. And even if they shouldn’t be able to find their parents soon, they would stay together. None of them had mentioned it yet, but Lil knew it.

She wouldn’t leave Jojo behind, just like Jojo wouldn’t let her die. It was an unspoken contract, written and signed when Jojo saved Lil in the hallway and stuck to her. And now, in this moment, both staring at the wall across from them, Lil was absolutely certain. They were in this together.

 

Suddenly, there was a gasp next to her and Jojo was up on her feet within half a second. “The TV! The lights still work but we didn’t check the TV!” She was already on her way to turn it on before Lil even grasped what she was talking about. “There’s gotta be something on the news! Maybe they know what the fuck is-”, her energetic tone dropped to a low mumble as the screen in the corner of the room came to life, “… going on.”

 

_ “- to stay calm. Furthermore, we advice all citizens to stay inside their homes and lock their doors and windows, if possible. Do not leave any secure areas until the local authorities have dealt with the situation at hand. _

_ There has not been an official statement about the exact nature of the threat but we have contacted several doctors, who suspect a new kind of brain disease to be responsible of provoking the infected to resort to acts of violence. This disease is said to be spread via bacteria within the body fluids of the infected. _

_ We advise that you should not, under any circumstances, come into contact with the infected. I repeat: Do not come into contact with the infected.” _

 

After that, the message started over from the beginning. Well, that was neither calming or particularly helpful. It wasn’t like the woman reading the message had given them a single new information… Although it  _ did _ confirm their suspicions. It really looked like they had been caught up in a real zombie apocalypse.

 

***

 

They had spent the remaining hours of the day with pointless talks that kept circling back to the beginning of the day. Talk about their hobbies lead to talks about free time which lead to talks about school and ended at Ms. Smith’s death.

 

Talks about how they would go about surviving more than a week didn’t end too rosy either. Since the cause of the infections were still unsure they didn’t even know whether the tap water was safe to drink.

The news had mentioned ‘bodily fluids’ but who knew what started this mess in the first place? They would have to live off of bottled water and half a bottle of Mountain Dew for now, which sounded about as fun as the realisation had been.

 

***

 

It got darker and darker throughout the evening and Lil’s eyelids started to grow heavy.

Eventually, they brought blankets and pillows into the living room, as well as the mattress that belonged to the guest room… And Jojo picked the couch and unceremoniously dropped onto it. Lil laid down on the mattress, wrapped herself up in her blanket and tried to force herself to calm down.

 

Falling asleep was hard. It had been a horribly long day and the stress and fear just didn't want to leave her alone. It made her feel sick, manifested in her guts like a swarm of bees buzzing around.

Jojo seemed to share that sentiment. When Lil glanced over to her she was still staring at the ceiling, picking on the skin of her lips with her short nails.

 

God, it was still hard to believe that they only knew each other for a single day. And it was just as hard to imagine what the next day could bring.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is my first fanfic in years so I would really appreciate if you could tell me what you think about it so far <3


	3. Unlikely new friends

Lil grabbed the two remaining energy bars and some more snacks while Jojo collected all the bottled water left in the house and brought it to their “Life Essentials” pile in the corner of the living room.

It was an incredibly sad sight. Their food supplies were exhausted. It had barely lasted them two days, the fridge had been nearly empty by the time they had arrived and the canned tomato soup they had found in one of the cupboards hadn’t done much to fill Lil’s or Jojo’s stomach either. Jojo’s dad hadn’t come back with a full shopping bag and Lil still couldn’t reach her own parents on their respective phones…

So, naturally, there had been a few discussions about what to do. Staying in the house without taking any further actions might have protected them from the zombies outside, but that didn’t mean that starving was a respectable alternative. The girls had decided that they had to do the one thing that was key to any zombie game; steal and scavenge as much food and other supplies they could get their hands on. Which was exactly what they were preparing for at the moment.

 

Both energy bars and a bottle of water got thrown into one of the two bags they had found - just to be prepared for a possible complication, of course. Lil had insisted on carrying them with her, even though it would mean they had slightly less space left for new supplies. Jojo didn’t seem too stoked about that, but didn’t say anything against it; Just like Lil didn’t like the implications of the note Jojo had left on the kitchen table.

It was addressed to her father and informed him of Jojo’s (and Lil’s) survival - which Lil was perfectly fine with, of course, since he could arrive there while they were gone. But the letter ended on a rather pessimistic note, with Jojo telling him the day and approximate time of their departure. “Just in case, you know,” she had told Lil as she continued on to write that she loved her dad and might be dead if he found this note longer than a week after the mentioned time.

Would it be necessary to mention that the atmosphere around them was kinda gloomy as they grabbed their bags and slowly crept out the front door? Because holy fuck, it was. Lil didn’t have much hope left that they would make the trip in one piece. Of course they had also bought weapons this time, the biggest, sharpest knives from the kitchen, Jojo’s trusted baseball bat and a sledgehammer that didn’t look like anyone had used it before… But the knife in her hand didn’t calm her the slightest bit.

They were outside again, after two days filled with anxious daydreams, and the world out there only looked less and less inviting with every hour. Although the streets weren’t as empty anymore as they were back when Lil had parked their stolen car in front of the house.

 

Just there, down the street, was a figure hunched over something that seemed to be not particularly alive anymore. It didn’t seem like it would look or crawl over into their direction any time soon but… Lil’s heart still tried to jump out of her chest. It was hard, looking away to watch where Jojo was leading her, when her eyes kept circling back into the other direction to make sure that _thing_ was still out of reach.

But it stayed. It stayed where it was, feeding on god knows what was lying there on the floor and hadn’t become one of the zombies yet. Unless… did those zombies actually know when someone was one of them? Did they even care? Or where they cannibalistic people-eaters with an endless hunger for flesh, no matter how rotten it was?

God, the cold shiver running down her back was her own fault, what was she even thinking about? Jojo and her had reached the end of the street by then and the figure Lil had spotted back at Jojo’s house was out of sight (which didn’t calm Lil at all, especially since they had to get back there later).

“It’s not far away, we’ll have to turn right at the end of the next street and then we’re basically there”, Jojo whispered with a tense tone in her voice. Lil couldn’t blame her, she was buzzing with anxiety herself.

 

Jojo rounded the next corner and came to an abrupt halt.

She was frozen in place, shoulders raised in surprise and shock when the starry-eyed woman jumped forward, coming right for her. The attack came out of nowhere. The knife in Lil’s hand was no more than a dead weight, in that moment. It was forgotten in her clenched fist as her instincts took over.

The woman tried to reach for Jojo, shoving her face dangerously close to hers and then - all of the sudden - Lil was on top of her and rammed the knife into her open mouth. She bit down on it, not done fighting yet, reaching her hands out to get a hold of Lil’s sides but they never touched her. Jojo had left her initial state of shock and took hold of the wrists of the dead woman, while Lil yanked out the knife and stabbed her again and again, turning her tongue into mush and her neck into a gory mess, and before she even knew it she had gouged out her eyes, but she was still moving, still _twitching_.

 

It felt like a century, an agonizing eternity, until she finally stopped moving. She finally _stopped_ . It was over, Lil was still sitting on her motionless stomach, blood splattered all over her clothes, her hands, even her face… but it was over. Her heartbeat slowly found back to its usual rhythm, her breathing got less heavy, finally slowed down… And then, the reality of the situation came crashing down on her. She was sitting on top of a dead body, a corpse that had tried to kill Jojo, and she had _killed_ it, cut it open, mangled it until its face was an unrecognizable mess of blood and flesh and exposed bone… and then there was the _smell._

She hadn’t noticed it until then, until the threat was over, and now it wouldn’t leave her lungs. It burned itself into her nose, rotten and gross, like that one rat her cat had killed and hidden behind the fridge where it had started to rot and fill with maggots. It was all too intense, all of it, the color of the blood, the smell, the warm hands on her shoulders, Jojo talking to her without any of her words reaching Lil’s mind, _that color of the blood and the smell of dead rats and the drops smeared over her hands and that smell and-_

She stumbled backwards, tried to get away from all of it, she could already taste the rot and bile in her mouth. She stumbled over to the side, back onto the sidewalk, over to the lawn, she could feel it rising in her chest, in her throat and-

She threw up, right there, only a few feet away from the corpse and the girl with the baseball bat.

Jojo hurried over to her, helped her get the bag off of her back and took the water bottle out while Lil was preoccupied with her hitching breath and the sour taste spreading in her mouth. Jojo unscrewed the bottle and held it out for Lil to take and she could fucking swear that Jojo would have deserved a halo of light over her head at that very moment. That mental image didn't survive for long, sadly, because another wave of sickness overcame her and the remaining fluids left in her stomach decided to leave her body accompanied by the grossest noises her throat could produce.

It was fucking disgusting. It was disgusting and Lil couldn't understand how Jojo was still standing there, holding that bottle of water with a look on her face that didn't spell out **utter disgust** at all.

“... You should try to drink something.” It was worry; written all over her face, in the little fold between her brows and the soft gaze she mustered even though her shoulders had been tense ever since they had started to prepare their trip an hour ago.

“Yeah, you’re-”, her dry throat forced her to cough; talking had become such a challenging task, “you're right. Thank you.”

Lil's hands were still shaking as she took the bottle and started to take a few testy sips, but to her (pleasant) surprise it decided to stay inside of her body instead of joining the other stuff on the grass next to her.

“Feeling better?” Jojo asked, which Lil answered with a little nod of her head. The water really did help. Although the sour aftertaste didn't seem to leave her mouth too soon, it got less intense and more bearable. She finally felt like a person again and less like a dirty towel lying on the ground.

“Can you stand up?” Jojo held out her hand again - this time to support Lil - and she took the offer and let Jojo pull her back onto her feet. Her legs were still wobbly but she would be fine.

“Thanks. I'm… I'm okay.”

Jojo nodded in response. She didn't look particularly relieved when she collected all their stuff again, throwing the bottle back into the bag and slowly started to make their way to the destination they were soon to reach. They only had to round more corner, and then they would be there. Lil's hands clung to the handle of her knife.

 

“Thank you”, Jojo whispered and broke the tense silence around them. Her voice was as coarse as Lil’s throat was dry and gross. Lil nodded. She didn't know what to say. What were you even supposed to say after _that_?

Although she understood what Jojo meant. Both had saved the other now, even though none of them really understood why the other or themself had done so. They were even now, in a way.

 

***

 

The glass door was locked and there didn’t seem to be any other way into the shop. But neither the door nor the big windows looked like they could withstand much force…

Well, it was a small shop, after all. It wasn’t like anyone would break into a tiny asian food store in the middle of the outskirts of nowhere.

… Besides two teenage girls who ran out of food on the third day of the zombie apocalypse, of course.

The irony was hard to ignore as Lil watched out for any potential threats and listened to Jojo curse behind her back. She had unpacked the sledgehammer they had taken with them for this very moment… And Jojo kept mumbling that she should have smashed that zombie’s head with that thing. The realization came… a tad too late for that.

 

“No zombies around”, Lil informed her shortly before Jojo destroyed the glass door accompanied by loud crashing noises which made Lil flinch. Sure, there weren’t any zombies around _yet_ , but if they were attracted by sounds… well, then they wouldn’t have much time until they knew for sure.

 The glass shards made a crunching noise as Jojo climbed into the store. Lil looked around for any signs of movement down the street, but it seemed to be clear, so she followed her inside.

Jojo had already started to shove various kinds of noodles and sauces into her bag. Lil tried to find as many things they didn’t have to cook but ended up grabbing a big sack of rice anyway. They still had electricity to cook so it was worth a try. And… well, even if the power went out, fire was still a thing they could make use of, so… whatever. They could surely use some rice.

 The girls had just gathered water and other beverages and started to split up their food (so the weight of their bags wouldn’t be too uneven) when Jojo stopped dead in her tracks.

"Wait." She held out a hand in front of Lil, signaling her to stay back. Her face looked stern, she was frowning as she waited for something to happen.

Her voice was barely audible when she finally turned to face Lil. "I think I heard something." Lil didn't manage to reply anything, the sudden lump in her throat didn’t let her. Not that she had anything important to say in the first place, she hadn’t noticed any sound at all. Her heart was beating loud enough that it could've covered up the steps of an entire army approaching. The uneasy look spreading on Jojo's face didn't make her feel any calmer either.

Had a zombie found its way in there because of them? Did one of them follow them through the broken door, already?

 

Jojo grabbed the sledgehammer and snuck over to one of the shelves. Lil followed her, trying to make as little noise as possible. This time would be different. None of them would freeze; None of them would get into a risky situation. They wouldn’t be caught off guard.

The crunching noise of shoes on broken glass told them that they had been right. Someone, no some _thing,_ was in front of the shop. They tried to sneak a peek at the door, see the zombie they would have to deal with…

 

Until both of them froze in their place upon the sudden speck of color coming into their view. The guy climbing through the door frame looked like he had just grabbed a handful of random clothes and got dressed in the dark. Who even wore that kind of warm hat at the end of spring?

And although he looked quite alive and well, the not quite dry specks of blood on his sweater vest kept Lil frozen in place. That never meant anything good. Even though he was still alive… he could be dangerous. He surely didn't look the part, but who knew whether that blood belonged to a zombie or regular person, either?

It took Lil a few seconds to realise how much of a hypocrite she was. But there were more important things going on. The boy had a cheerful look on his face before he turned back to the door. “Hey Jon, get in here.”

He wasn’t alone, apparently. Another guy climbed through the broken door. He was a bit taller than the colorful guy and had a considerably smaller amount of blood and dirt on his gray hoodie. She couldn’t see his face, but something about his haircut seemed… eerily familiar?

No- wait, he turned around and-... Wait, what the _fuck_?

 

“Jonathan?”

 Lil came out of her hiding spot without a second thought. “Lil, what are you _doing_ ?” Jojo hissed, janking on her arm to get her back behind the shelf. Not that it would have been of any use _now_. Both of the intruders had turned towards them, staring at Lil with a mixture of surprise and silent wonder.

 “Wait… Lil? What are you doing here?”

 “I… was about to ask you the same thing?”

What was she even supposed to say to that? ‘Oh yeah we were just robbing this store… what about you?’ What… what was even going _on_ ? There was just… no way. What was he doing there? What were the _chances_???

 “Well, uhm… Sock and I were gonna grab some food,” he paused when he noticed the knife in her hand, “which is probably exactly what you where going for?”

 The person who was apparently called ‘Sock’ curiously glanced from one to the other. “Oh you know each oth-... oh, hi Jojo!”

 “What the fuck are _you_ doing here?” Jojo had come out of her hiding spot and took a protective stance in front of Lil. She stared at Sock like he had just murdered her first born. 

He looked about as surprised and Lil felt. “Uhm… we’re still looking for food?”

Did they… did they know each other as well?

… What the fuck was _happening_?

 

***

 

What followed was an incredibly awkward exchange. Not that the previous one had been any better, really.

Lil introduced Jojo to Jonathan. He happened to be in a few of Lil’s classes and they had worked on a history project together, which didn’t turn out to be a complete disaster, so they were on good terms. Jojo didn’t seem to trust him just from Lil telling her that he was a good guy, though.

And, well… Sock and Jojo turned out to be childhood friends/enemies, depending on which one of the two you would ask.

And Jojo surely didn’t seem to be fond of him. At all. Which might have also caused her suspicions towards Jon.

 

“And… you two are friends?” Jon asked, nodding into Jojo’s direction. He was clearly trying to break the awkward atmosphere… with another awkward question. An incredible plan with poor execution.

"Yeah,” Lil replied, “Jojo saved me at the school, I wouldn’t be standing here if it weren’t for her…”

“She's basically my guardian angel at this point," Lil added. Jojo tried to hide the way the corners of her mouth had twitched upwards but Lil had seen it happen before she had managed to turn away.  
Jonathan nodded and answered with a shrug: "Sock has saved me on more than one occasion, too. He’s pretty handy with a knife so… I guess I could say the same about Sock, wouldn't be here withou-"

Jojo almost choked on her own spit. "What!? That freak?? He's a fucking _demon_!"

"Jojo!” Lil really didn’t understand where all that resentment and aversion came from, all of the sudden. Sure, she only knew her for a short while but that expression just… didn’t fit her at all. She didn’t seem like the person to make that kind of hot headed and thoughtless comment. Okay, maybe she did, but not in this kind of situation.

She shot Jojo a look that was supposed to say ‘Dude, he has a knife _and_ he’s covered in blood. You have a sledgehammer in your hand and _we_ almost died today. And for the love of god, you don’t bring a fucking hammer to a knife fight.’

The look obviously didn’t manage to convey that much, but Jojo seemed to get the gist of it. She still squinted into Sock’s direction but didn’t look like she would kill him any second now. Not yet, at least.

Jonathan shot her a questioning look, but didn’t dare to make a comment about what had just happened. God, Lil was so glad at least one of the others seemed to have some sense of tact.

Sock, on the other hand, either didn’t mind that Jojo had just insulted him, or he… didn’t realise? He was hard to place, really. He just smiled on and commented: “Not gonna lie, being a demon sounds pretty cool.”

He disappeared behind a shelf and began to hum as he stuffed some things into the bag he had been carrying on his back up until then.

Jojo began to fume quietly while Lil shot Jon a questioning look which was met with a noncommittal shrug. Wonderful to know that they were both left in the dark.

 

He soon joined Sock in collecting a variety of food items. Lil and Jojo went back to their sorting activities, as well. They stored all the food and drinks away and even managed to squeeze some little snacks into the gaps they had found. Their bags ended up being a bit heavier than expected, but still manageable. Lil would have to carry the rice in her arms though, it just simply took away too much space.

Of course they would have been able to take more if they had taken the car, but… well, Lil surely hadn’t been too keen on driving again any time soon. And of course they didn’t know if the noise would have attracted something more dangerous than two teenage boys, who just so happened to be acquaintances of them.

 That whole time they had packed their bags, Jojo hadn’t stopped watching the guys out of the corner of her eyes, so it was no surprise to Lil that she stood up and took a protective stance in front of her when the colorful ‘Sock’ appeared in front of them.

 “We’re done picking up stuff now, so we’re gonna head back soon,” he informed them, eyes darting back and forth between Jojo and Lil, who just got up herself and stood next to Jojo by then. Sock paused for a second, gaze wandering to the ceiling, clearly lost in thought… Before he gave the girls a bright smile and went on to keep talking.

“You two can join us, if you want to! We’re hiding out in my basement; my parents basically converted it into an apocalypse bunker so it’s pretty safe down there. And Jonathan is alright with it, too, so…”

 

Jojo stared at him for approximately half a second before grabbing Lil’s arm and pulling her back behind the shelving unit. Lil didn’t even have time to process the words he had just said before Jojo grabbed her shoulders and gave her a piercing stare.

"Lil, you have no idea! He's not only freaky, he's straight up _dangerous_!" Her whisper resembled the hiss of a threatened cat.

 Lil was still trying to understand what had just gone down. Had he really just… offered to team up with them? And to let them stay at a literal _apocalypse bunker_? That was almost too good to be true.

 "Wait, wait, wait! Jojo, did you just listen to what he _said_?” she couldn’t quite believe what she was about to say herself, but… “We’re not gonna get a chance like that again, this is a great opportunity for us.”

They had wanted to be part of a bigger group anyway, so why did this decision have to be so _hard_ all of the sudden?

 Seeing the frustration painted on Jojo’s face felt like a kick in the guts, but Lil wouldn’t back down on this. She had no idea what her problem with Sock consisted of, but… this was their best shot. Staying in Jojo’s living room with constantly dwindling resources was one of the worst opportunities they had.

 “ _Please,_ Jojo. Give this a _chance._ If he’s with Jonathan he must be okay, and you _know_ we could really use someone who can actually _fight_.”

Jojo’s eyebrows were furrowed and the anger lingered in her eyes. She obviously didn’t want to back down either. And she seemed to have some really big unresolved issues with Sock.

"Okay! Great!” she snarled and threw her hands up in the air. “Sure, you can team with them if you want, but I'd rather die than go with that guy!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ayyy we finally met the boys!!  
> EDIT: The amazing LucaRosaLafur (on instagram) aka Luca LaFaire (on Youtube) has created an amazing animatic for the first 3 chapters of this fic, ending at this very point, and it's so cool and amazing! You have to check it out, I swear! Watch it right [HERE](https://youtu.be/5eRo24hV_gg)
> 
> You should also take a look at fireweep's gorgeous art pieces for this fic!! There's another one for this chapter and it's wonderful! If you haven't looked at them yet, they'll be linked again [HERE](https://www.instagram.com/p/Bl6DuPchrto/?utm_source=ig_share_sheet&igshid=rpsbzeb01n2y)


	4. Zombies, Weirdos and Big Decisions

"I can't fucking believe we teamed up with them." Jojo’s voice was filled with regret and barely hidden distaste as they followed the boys to Sock’s place.

"And yet, you're still here." Lil couldn’t help but smile. It hadn’t been as hard to convince her as she had expected. Of course she would have never even dreamt of leaving Jojo behind, but she might have suggested that she would go with the others… By literally following them outside. It had only taken about 20 feet before Jojo had come out of the store and groaned in defeat. So… well, it was safe to say that Lil deserved the stare-down Jojo was giving her.

The prospect of having a safer place to stay at and additional company had lifted Lil’s mood too much to give in to the gloom. A chuckle escaped her before she even knew it. "Come on, you know you love me."

"Oh shut up,” Jojo shot back, but there was hardly any bite left in her voice.

Only the sound of their footsteps and the chatter in front of them echoed from the houses walls for a while.

"But you gotta promise me we’re gonna ditch them the very second one of them acts strange," she paused to glance at Lil, "Deal?"

"Yeah." She nodded. Lil still didn’t quite get it, but if that would make her happy… she would agree to Jojo’s condition. Especially since she had to admit to forcing Jojo to come with her, in a way. She hadn’t really given her any other option, after all.

 

***

 

Sock’s house was closer to the center of the city, so the occasional abandoned car came into view… And bloodied pavement, as well as dead bodies, were a reoccuring sight at that point. Her heart began to pound every time she spotted a lumb of clothed flesh and her shoulders got more and more tense with every step they made into the direction of one of them.

The small group came across quite a few of them, and although none of the corpses came back to life to kill them, Lil was certain she would have a heart attack any second now. She was so on edge that even an annoyed huff from Jojo made her look around in paranoia. 

They had been walking for quite a few minutes now and she felt like the sack of rice started to weigh about three tons more than it had at the store. She was just about to ask Jojo if she would mind carrying it for a minute or two - which she could already guess the answer to - as Sock made a surprised noise in front of them. And Lil found out about the cause of that as soon as she looked ahead. She was pretty sure her heart just missed a beat.

They walked right into a group of three zombies fighting over a severed leg… which they immediately lost interest in as they noticed the four very much alive people standing in front of them. The four people who would definitely prefer to keep their legs and other extremities attached to their body.

They immediately targeted the person at the front of their group.

 

And that was when shit hit the fan.

 

It barely took a moment until Sock was surrounded by three hungry zombies and Lil’s rice was forgotten as it met the floor with a thud. One of the monsters looked into their direction before it decided that the rice-dropping-girl was another acceptable target.

Jonathan had been underselling his friend. He wasn't only  _ ‘pretty handy with a knife’ _ , he was using it as if it was part of his hand, merely an extension of his arm, as he ran right into the arms of a dead man and rammed his knife as far into his skull as his eye socket allowed it.

Droplets of blood sprayed onto his face when he pulled out the knife and shoved it back into his skull. But Sock didn’t seem to mind or care about getting his hands dirty as he took him out with expert precision.

Jonathan, on the other hand, had attacked the remaining one with his knife, but Lil had no time to actually see what was going on with them at that point.

She still tried to open the side pocket of her bag - the place she had decided to store her knife in - but the zipper was stuck. Of course it was stuck, the only moment during which she desperately needed it to work, and it wouldn’t open at all and oooh my god, when did the zombie get so close?

Jojo whacked it into the head, sending it flying onto the floor, right when Sock hurried over to them, covered in more blood than before, and took a big swing at its head, successfully burying his knife in its skull. The zombies stopped moving soon after and turned into just another big, dead and bloody corpse.

Lil was still breathing heavily as she finally managed to open up the zipper. Not that it would have been of any use at that point, with all three zombie lying on the floor. Dead, this time for sure. Which was exactly what Lil had almost been.

She swallowed hard, picked up her bag and the rice again… and this time she left the side pocket open.

  
  


***

 

It had only taken them about three more minutes to reach Sock’s home. It looked pretty much identical to the others on that street. But they didn’t take the time to appreciate the well-kept garden nor the recently painted walls.

Sock lead them around to the backyard from which he unlocked a big metal hatch that lead down to the promised basement/apocalypse bunker.

It wasn’t as dark or uninviting as Lil had imagined it to be just judging by its name. It actually just looked like a really well-kept basement with reinforced walls and two entrances. You could apparently enter it from the hatch they had come through and another one that lead straight up through the ceiling in one corner of the big main area. That one obviously also featured a sturdy looking metal ladder.

The big shelves covering the walls made for great places to store their… very much  _ stolen _ food in. There were quite a few metal cans stacked on one of them, already, so their food situation looked good to her.

The place was big, underground and unreachable for zombies. Not that Lil expected them to actually  _ try  _ to reach this kind of place, anyway.

One of the corners was littered with trash that must have collected throughout the past days, but that seemed to be the only real downside of the place. It pretty much looked like the perfect hideout.

Sock even told them that they could wash off all the blood in the small restroom to the side and then went on to proudly announce that they would even have power for about a week in case of an outage.

 

***

 

The sleeping situation was less than ideal. It was only logical that Sock’s family would keep 3 mattresses in their apocalypse bunker, since, ya know, they were only three people in total.

But. Well. While Lil didn't count math to her strongest subjects, she was sharp enough to notice they were one person off.

Jojo’s first remark on that matter was, that she volunteered Sock to sleep on the floor…  _ ‘or outside’ _ , as she added under her breath. That earned her a disapproving Look™ from Lil, but the boy in question didn't seem to have noticed any ill intend at all. He even exclaimed that he would willingly share a bed with Jonathan, whose elbow immediately met Sock’s side; the universal gesture of ‘shut up’.

Lil’s mouth acted on it's own when she told them that they shouldn't worry, they could keep their current level comfort; she and Jojo would take their 3rd mattress. It was only natural that they would share it, it would have been rude to expect their hosts to give up on a mattress when they already let them take shelter in Sock’s basement… right?

 

***

 

Thought that Jojo’s sleeping face did look kind of cute, in a way (she supposed), might have crossed her mind (once or twice) during the few nights they had spend camping out in Jojo’s living room… But that didn't mean Lil would have any reason to celebrate now, given the fact that… well, they would now have to spend the night huddled together.

Previously, a canyon of floor and air had separated Jojo’s spot on her couch and Lil’s sleeping place on the old mattress. Now, they shared another old mattress and a dusty blanket. And, of course, Lil had no reason to freak out. Nope. There was no nervousness present in her body whatsoever. She was the embodiment of ‘being totally chill’.

Why would she even be anxious? It wasn’t like she had never slept in the same bed as another person. And Jojo was her friend. It wasn’t like she was gonna kill her in her sleep...

So why wouldn’t her heart stop drumming in her chest? What was wrong with her? Lil couldn’t get the faint sound of Jojo’s breathing out of her head. It was like a melody, soft and sweet.

She found it even harder to ignore than Sock’s snoring coming from the other side of the room. And that was surprising, given the fact that Lil was under the impression that she had never heard anything quite as annoying as the sounds coming out of the comatose boy.

She could barely make out his form in the dimly lit basement, but his impression of a wet sack of flour seemed to be spot-on. He was lying on his back with his limbs strewn away from his body. And the ‘smack’ of his hand meeting the face of the boy next to him wasn’t easy to miss either.

But Jonathan only grunted a little and shoved the hand out of his face again with no further protests. After that, he didn’t even stir in his sleep. It was a mystery to Lil how he had managed to grow accustomed to sleeping in the same room as Sock.

But eventually, the noises faded away as Lil finally found the sleep she had been hoping to get.

 

***

 

The next morning had begun kind of slow and sluggish. Jojo and Sock had already been up when Lil opened her eyes for the first time. They were very busy Not Talking To Each Other though. Jojo scratched dried blood off her shoes while Sock sat at the other side of the room and examined his collection of knives. He must have cleaned them at some point; they weren’t covered in blood anymore.

Lil tried to prompt Jojo to some kind of small talk but she didn’t seem to be in a talkative mood that day. She did, however, remark that they had to return to her home within the week. She didn’t want her dad to come home to an empty house and a note that told him she was dead. At least not until that was actually the case. She really couldn’t help it, at that point.

Lil agreed, if her dad should return during their absence they really should check on him. He was important to Jojo and she would respect that.

“I want to see my parents again, too,” she remarked.

Sock’s voice suddenly piped up right behind her and made her jump. “Do you know if they’re still alive?” he asked. But Lil couldn’t find it in her to answer, she was busy wheezing from the shock, instead. She was sure he had just caused her to have her first ever heart attack. She hadn’t heard his steps at all, it was like he had just appeared out of thin air.

“Oh, sorry, didn’t mean to scare you,” he apologized with a genuine expression, while Jojo stared daggers at him… Which he didn’t seem to notice.

“N-no problem,” Lil lied. God, they should get him one of these catbells to prevent this from happening again.

“So, what about your parents?” he reminded her of his question that she definitely didn’t forget about already. (She totally did.)

“Oh, well uhm.” Where should she even start? “I… I haven’t seen them since first day, when the zombies got into our school.” She scratched the back of her neck. “And, well… I was at Jojo’s place since then. I had no chance to contact or look for them so… I’m really worried about them. Especially since they were at work when it all started.”

“Oh damn, that sucks… Do you want our help? To search for them, I mean?”

Wait What. What?  _ What?  _ “For… for  _ real _ ?”

“Yeah, sure,” he shrugged, “if you’re going to search for them, we might as well tag along. It’ll be safer than you two going alone.”

“Wow-... I… holy shit? Thank you, I… really don’t know what to say? Just… wow. Thanks.”

"No problem. Besides, maybe we can even stock up on food while we're at it," he hummed, “Doesn’t hurt to have some more in stock, just in case, you know?”

"yeah, she- she actually works at 7-Eleven, so that'll work."

Sock looked thrilled. "Wow, that's great! Two birds with one stone!"

Holy shit. They would really help her find her parents. Or, well, Sock at least, Jonathan was still asleep after all. And although he did stir in his sleep more frequently now that they had been talking for a short while, that surely didn’t count as agreement… yet.

But, well… It would make everything so much easier. Especially since Sock didn’t seem to have as big of a problem with killing zombies as Lil had experienced just the day before.

Just… wow. Lil didn’t understand what Jojo had been worried about. He seemed like a great dude. A little weird, for sure, but who would offer his help with such a dangerous plan without them being A Good Dude?

Unless… he had ulterior motives. But what could he want from them? … Maybe he needed help as well? Maybe his parents were in a similar situation and he needed their help to search for them, too?

Oh god, she already sounded like Jojo. It was way too soon for any conspiracy theories. She should just… ask him. About his parents, that it.

“What about yours?” she said, trying to sound as casual as possible, and failing terribly. Unless ‘casual’ had shortly become a synonym to ‘nervous af’.

“Hm?” Sock had just glanced over into Jonathan’s direction but focused back on Lil after realising she had asked him a question. “What did you say?”

“Well… your parents don’t seem to be at home so… Do you know where they are?”

“Oh, yeah. They’re at the graveyard.”

“Huh?” That was not the answer she had expected.

“They’re dead.”

 

“Oh, I-... I’m sorry to hear that.” Oh shit. She didn’t mean to make it this awkward. She should’ve probably known, right? Did she miss a hint at some point? God, this was horrible.  _ You can’t just ask people about their  _ **_dead parents’_ ** _ whereabouts. _

But Sock didn’t seem too shaken about it. He just shrugged and acted like it was no big deal. “Well, it’s not like you could change that.” He paused, Lil could practically see the gears turning in his head. He did, however, soon come to the conclusion that he wouldn’t spare her of the details and started to speak up again. “Had to kill them myself, they were already infected when I came home.”

That hit Lil like a brick to the face. She really couldn’t have prevented the stunned silence that followed. “Oh shit, I-... I’m really sorry to hear that, that must be… really horrible.” Wow. Just… fuck. How can you fuck up at conversing that badly?

Sock didn’t seem to pick up on the awkward atmosphere surrounding them. Or at least he didn’t mention it. “Well, it was the only logical solution. They’re better off dead than walking the streets and killing people,” a weary sigh escaped him. “They wouldn’t have liked that, you know?”

“And, well, I gave them a proper burial and all that, so… I suppose they can rest in peace now,” he concluded with a shrug.

 

Lil only nodded absentmindedly. Holy shit, what had this guy  _ been through _ ? It had only been a couple days since everything started and he had already lost his entire close family? And singlehandedly  _ buried them _ , apparently? How was he still comparatively sane after such a traumatic event? How did he manage to walk upright and kill zombies left and right with such  _ ease _ ?

A bitter sounding chuckle escaped him and brought Lil’s attention back to him. “It’s kinda ironic, actually.”

“My parents were kind of obsessed about the whole apocalypse thing. They were convinced we would need to take cover and live in our basement for a few weeks at some point… But they were counting on a natural disaster; hurricanes or that kinda jazz. That's why they stashed tons of food in our basement… No one was allowed to touch it, though. Not until the literal end of the world.” It was the first time she couldn’t hear any trace of joy in his voice.

“They would've rather died of starvation before using any of that...” He only paused for half a second before chatting on with his usual chipper voice. “Didn't keep me from sneaking out all the good stuff though.”

Sock stood up and dusted off his dirty and torn jeans.

“And they were the ones calling  **me** crazy for thinking a zombie apocalypse could happen one day. Somehow  **that’s** where they drew the line.

But I guess I won that bet. Not that it's gonna be of any use to me  _ now _ . They're both dead, after all.”

Lil just nodded. She really didn’t know how to respond in any other way. That was a lot of… weird information that she really couldn’t quite place. He was… probably just… grieving? In his own way? She supposed? God, what were you supposed to say to someone who just told you he was forced to kill his own parents and then  _ buried them _ ???

Lil felt her skin crawl. This conversation was… incredibly uncomfortable, to say the least.

But she was rescued by none other than Jonathan, her mighty hero, who had finally woken up and walked over to them with a slouch and yawned before he could get a tired “Good morning” out.

“Hey there, sleepyhead,” Sock greeted him with his usual upbeat voice, “slept well?”

“Nah,” he answered groggily, “would’ve slept better if you would stop hitting me in your sleep.”

“Is anyone else hungry?” he added right as Sock opened his mouth to protest.

That’s when Jojo’s voice finally piped up again. “Yeah, me too.”

Huh, she really was set on not talking to Sock, or let alone acknowledging his existence. 

“Yeah, same”, Lil commented.

 

The power was still on so they ventured out of the basement and up into the kitchen to cook some of the rice they had picked up the day before. Lil avoided looking at the specks of dry blood on the floor, but the cold shiver running down her back surely did a great job of reminding her about the conversation she had just had.

When they got back in the chilly basement and mixed their rice with the sauces Jojo had picked up from the store, their walk to that place snuck back into Lil’s thoughts. She really wanted to avoid reminding herself of the dead woman they had faced, but she really couldn’t help it. There was something at the back of her head. It bugged her, filled her with guilt she didn’t want to feel.

“What do you guys know about the…” Lil wasn't sure whether she could call them ‘zombies’ around them, especially because of Sock’s… really fucked up experiences with them, “the  _ infected _ ?”

Fuck, she didn't even know if you could really  _ call _ them zombies… Even though all the evidence suggested just that. The woman had looked so dead and hungry. Just like that teacher… She really didn’t want them to be ‘alive’. She would rather know them to be incurable instead of having to live with the thoughts that she had killed a  _ real person _ . Oh, god. That sounded terrible. She swallowed down another spoonful of rice. “Do you think they're actually dead?”

Jonathan only thought about it for half a beat. “Yeah, I'm pretty sure they're dead. Sock beheaded one and it still tried to bite me.”

Sock turned to him and started to pout. “Not like it had any chance to get you at that point! It didn't move far with the body a few feet away.” Apparently, he didn't seem to like the implication that he had failed to protect his friend.

Jojo, on the other hand, was still giving them the silent treatment.

There had been one detail that had sparked Lil’s interest though. “Wait, did only the head move or was the body still alive, too?” Not that she wouldn't love to know how the fuck that boy with the tiny frame and thin arms had managed to muster the strength to sever a person's head from their body… But she had a gut feeling that she shouldn't actually find out about that. For her own sanity, at least.

Sock's eyebrows shot up to the sky. His eyes followed their path into that direction for a moment… before his gaze dropped back into Lil’s general direction. “Nah, I'm pretty sure only the head kept moving.”

“... Like in The Walking Dead, you know?” he added, eyes bright and cheerful despite the current topic of conversation.

That settled more than one question. First of all… the zombies did seem to be pretty dead after being infected. That wouldn't make it easier to kill them but… maybe it would help her get used to it. She really,  _ really _ didn't want to think of them as  _ real people _ . Not if she had to kill them. But, well… if there really was no way for them to get ‘healthy’ again… maybe she could manage?

And secondly, she could apparently call them zombies if the boy compared them to the ‘Walkers’ from a TV show about zombies.

 

***

 

They all went back to their respective sides of the room after their shared meal. Sock and Jonathan had been caught up in playful banter that dissolved in Sock giving him increasingly weird and annoying pet names, and even Jojo finally started to talk to Lil again. Although she would have preferred it to be about a different topic.

“You  _ do _ realise that his story sounded _ fucking crazy _ , right?”, Jojo had whispered when she was sure enough that Sock was busy and wouldn’t overhear their conversation.

Lil took a deep breath before answering. Oh boy, this was gonna be a fun conversation. “ _ Please, _ Jojo, he just lost his parents. Cut him some slack, he’s probably still grieving.”

Sock starting to laugh at that very moment surely didn’t help to get Lil’s point across. Jojo eyed him sceptically. “Dunno ‘bout you, but he doesn’t look too shaken up about it.”

Of course he was weird, but… God, Lil really couldn’t understand Jojo’s problem with him as long as she didn’t  _ explain it to her _ . How could she still be so bitter and suspicious of him if they hadn’t seen each other for, quite literally, a few years?

The silence stretched on for a short while before Lil found any words. They surely weren’t the best or right words… but… they were words, so that was a good start?

“Hey, Jojo? Why do you hate him so much? What happened between you two?” she really wanted to know and made sure that her voice conveyed that. She was… a bit worried, in a way. She really wanted to trust Jojo’s judgement, but she couldn’t help but feel like it was clouded by petty conflicts of the past.

“It’s just-... it’s complicated. I… I don’t really want to talk about it, not right now,” she glanced over at Sock again, “and not here.”

Lil couldn’t help but feel defeated. How was she supposed to understand her this way? But to her surprise, Jojo took a deep breath and continued to talk.

“Just… just trust me when I say that you should be careful around him, okay? It’s just… man, you can’t trust him, he’s unreliable as fuck and…” she lowered her voice even more, dropping into a barely audible whisper, “he used to kill squirrels and other small animals when we were in elementary school. Something  _ wrong  _ with him.”

Oh, that-... oh. So he… killed animals when he was just a child? How did he even get his hands on a squirrel? That was a lot to stomach in one day.

Lil could definitely see where Jojo’s suspicions came from but… well, he was a child when that happened, after all. It’s been… almost ten years since then. He might have just been a child whose parents didn’t teach him about death yet? … God she just… really didn’t want to believe the guy wearing a silly hat and flashy colored clothes, who had offered them shelter and his help to find Lil’s mom, was actually a cold-blooded murderer who had no problem killing animals or even his  _ very own parents _ .

“And now I-... I’m just really worried he might end up hurting you, okay?” Jojo added, voice dark and certain while her face told a different story; flushed, leaving a light pink on her cheeks and nose.

Lil couldn’t believe her eyes. Or ears, for that matter. Jojo was… worried about her safety?  _ That _ was her problem? She had been so suspicious of Sock because she wanted to  _ protect her? _ It was… incredibly silly, in a way… so why did that mean so much to Lil?

“I… th-thank you.” Lil could feel her own face heat up. “I wouldn’t want you to get hurt, either” … ooOOOh god, what was she even talking about now?? “I just… I just feel like he might have changed, you know? If he really wants to help us find my parents, we shouldn’t just… turn down that offer and act like we couldn’t really use his help. Maybe he can even help us find your dad?”

Jojo sighed again, but her eyes didn’t dart back to Sock this time. Her expression had softened a little and her eyes met Lil’s with only a hint of worry. “You’re probably right. Just… keep the promise you made,” she said, throwing one last piercing look into Sock’s direction, “as soon as he does something weird, we’re outta here.”

Lil nodded. She didn’t expect her to just give up just like that, anyway. “Alright.” She could live with that.   


“Thanks.” Jojo squeezed her hand reassuringly, just for the fraction of a moment, and the butterflies in Lil’s stomach came to life and began to  _ dance _ . 

Well fuck. She might, maybe,  _ possibly _ have a crush on Jojo.

That totally didn’t make everything more complicated at all… was what she tried to make herself believe… because it totally did.

 

But she didn’t have any more time to worry about that. Sock approached them at that very moment, dragging Jon behind him by the sleeve of his sweater.

“Hey Lil! I just told Jon about your plan and he agreed to come with us”, he exclaimed, clearly proud of his persuasion skills. 

Jon only sighed, visibly contemplating his life choices for a moment.

“Well, I guess  _ someone _ has to be his voice of reason,” he explained, side eyeing Sock with tired eyes, “Wouldn’t want you to get yourself killed out there,” he sighed. The weariness in his voice seemed more playful than real.

Just like Sock didn’t look quite as offended as his voice sounded when Jon grabbed the front of his hat and pulled it over his eyes. 

Lil still couldn’t help but beam at Jojo. She couldn’t believe they were really gonna do this. They were really gonna go to her mom’s workplace.

They would really walk over there and rescue her mom out of that stupid 7-Eleven.


	5. A trip to 7-Eleven

The amount of zombies in the streets had risen considerably, the closer they got to the center of the town. Sock had a talent for finding the safest streets with the least amount of them walking around, but they couldn't avoid them all.

They were lucky to have him on their side, Sock had even managed to sneak up on some of them to take them out before they even know what was gonna happen to them.

It was really impressive, in a way… But mostly scary. How the hell did that tiny guy learn _how to do that kind of stuff_? A cold shiver had crawled down her back at that thought.

_Right, the squirrels._

But she had other things to worry about, now that the 7-Eleven was in sight. She could only sneak a short peek at their destination before Jojo pulled her over to into the entryway of a closeby building that Sock and Jonathan followed them to.

Jojo’s voice was quiet and tense as she spoke up.

“Okay, we need to work on a plan. Walking in through the front door doesn’t seem like an option here.”

Lil had to agree with her. There had been at least fifteen, maybe twenty, zombies standing or walking close to the entrance alone.

 

“I could distract them long enough for you to get inside,” Sock suggested with a shrug. Judging by Jojo’s face she was honestly considering the option… but Jonathan didn't seem as keen on potentially sacrificing Sock for their mission. “No way. That's way too dangerous, you can't fight off such a big group on your own.”

Sock just rolled his eyes and put on a tone of playful offense as he shot back: “I never said I would _fight_ them! Come on, Jonathan! I'm fast, I can easily outrun them!”

Jon’s eyelid twitched as he went on to disagree and they began to bicker some more… but Lil hadn't really paid them much attention in the first place.

Something was bugging her. If the _front_ door was the problem… maybe they would have more luck at the back? Lil was sure it got used for deliveries. And she could recall her mom talking about her coworkers taking smoke breaks out there… so maybe it was worth a try.

She cut Sock off, who was in the middle of explaining how exactly he would go about distracting the zombies, and told them about her thoughts on the matter.

Jonathan still glared at Sock when he agreed to Lil. “Yeah, at least that sounds like a reasonable plan for once.”

Sock shrugged again. “Well, sounds good to me… But my offer still stands,” he commented.

Jojo didn't look sold on the matter, though. “But how do we get in there? You can’t tell me we’ll just walk through the backdoor with no problems whatsoever, it’s gotta be locked.”

Lil quickly stole a glance at the 7-Eleven. If anyone was still in there, they had to be in the back of the store, maybe in the breakroom. “Yeah I know. But the front door could be locked, too. Maybe they closed the store before any zombies could get inside… we wouldn’t have any luck at the front door either, in that case.”

She might have been grasping at straws, but there was also the option that her mom was hiding in the back of the store and would open the door for her daughter. An awkward silence bagan to spread between them as the others considered her plan.

To her surprise, Jonathan was the first one to break it. “Well, it’s worth a try. If it’s locked we can still try to lure them away from the front and break in.”

Jojo reluctantly agreed while Sock celebrated his victory with an excited grin. “You finally agreed to my plan!”

“Nope, we’re still not gonna use you as zombie bait.” His deadpan voice didn’t manage to dull Sock’s good mood. He just went on explaining how they would have to sneak around this zombie-packed street.

 

The longer they had been outside, the more obvious it had become that the zombies they were facing weren’t quite as dumb as their movie counterparts. They were not particularly observant but they would try to catch and eat you as soon as they spotted you. They could tell if you were still alive or not; just like Lil and the others could identify a zombie by how unnatural it looked, they could see that you were still too alive to be one of them. And therefore, you counted as prey.

And that was when it got dangerous. Outrunning wasn’t impossible, but incredibly hard to do. They weren’t particularly fast, but they weren’t slow either. They pretty much walked and ran like a regular person who didn’t get a lot of exercise and maybe had a foot or hip injury, depending on how they had died. They had also passed by a few who’s feet or legs had been torn apart and damaged beyond repair. Those usually crawled but didn’t get far.

The biggest problem were the ones that could walk just fine… Their stamina seemed to be virtually inexhaustible, following you for as long as could see or hear you.

One good thing, however, was that the zombies’ sense of smell appeared to be just as bad as the one of a regular human. Of course it wouldn’t get any easier to smell whether something alive was closeby, when your own body was rotting away under, or including, your nose.

Their sense of hearing, however, was a whole ‘nother thing. It didn’t seem to be heightened but it surely was present. And it seemed to be just as good as a living persons’. Any sudden or loud noises attracted their attention… just like it did for any living being, really.

So it all boiled down to “Don’t let the zombies see or hear you and you’ll be fine”, which is exactly how Sock had managed to lead them up to this point. And, well, they might have also started to abuse that knowledge on their way to this intersection.

Jojo had been picking up stones along the way for the very situation they had found themselves in. She would distract them by throwing some rocks over the zombies’ heads and to the right side of the streets. They would make use of the only perk of their decent hearing.

Jojo still looked uncomfortable with their plan to walk right past this big group without any bigger distraction and Lil could relate to that. There was so much that could go wrong, so many things they could fuck up just on their way over to the store. She didn’t even want to think about how they would have to improvise once they came upon an unexpected obstacle.

 

Sock interrupted her thoughts with a gesture of his hand. That meant he had found an opportune moment, no one was looking into their direction. It was time to move.

Jojo joined him by the corner of the house, shoulders tense and eyes keen. She searched for a good spot to hit. Lil and Jonathan stood right behind her as she raised her hand and put all her strength into catapulting two big pebbles into the opposite directions of their destination.

It was honestly impressive, but… well, Jojo was the only one of the group who actually knew how to throw a ball further than 50 feet, so Lil was probably not the one to judge the impressiveness of a throw. Although… she also looked really cool while doing that. It surely wasn’t the right time nor place but Lil could be the judge for coolness, at least.

A couple of the zombies turned towards the noise and one or two followed suit, just to see what the others had spotted… But it wasn’t enough quite yet. Jojo took another small rock into her hand, this one was almost as big as her palm, and she managed to hit almost the exact same spot again.

The rock bounced off of the pavement before scraping over it and coming to a halt. That one definitely caught most of the zombies’ attention. And if they didn’t hear it, they at least wanted to know if the others had just spotted a prey.

It looked like the perfect opportunity, so Sock went ahead and motioned them to follow him. As quiet as possible, of course. So they tiptoed over to the other side of the street, trying to hurry as much as they could without anyone noticing their footsteps.

One of them must have heard them though, a dead man in sweatpants followed them into the small alleyway at the side of the store. He didn’t come from the direction where the distracted zombies had stood. No, he came stumbling towards them from the other side. They must have overlooked him. It was a stupid mistake, they should’ve have prevented that.

 

But Sock didn’t let that throw him off. He stayed as calm as ever, he just motioned the others to stay back as he took him out.

The body hit the floor with a thud and they stayed in place for a few more seconds, trying to be as quiet as possible… but they were lucky, no other zombies had followed them.

Lil let out a shaky breath she had been holding in. Thank god. But it was a little too early to be relieved just yet, she realised as she took in their surroundings.

There was more than just a little blood splattered on the dark pavement in the alleyway and the backdoor was wide open. They could just walk right in, after all.

Lil tried not to think about the implications. There was still hope that her mom had taken the backdoor as an escape route instead of locking herself in, right? … But if she wasn’t here… Lil had lead her friends to this dangerous place for no reason at all.

She took a deep breath before she followed Sock and Jonathan inside. Even if she wouldn’t find her mom, it was still worth it. They would stock up on food and prepare for another trip to her dad’s office building. It was only a few blocks away… and if he wasn’t there, they could still check out her apartment.

 

The inside of the storage room had another surprise in store for them. Mostly consisting of more blood, of course. The smell of rot and decay was sickening. It crawled into Lil’s nose and made her gag, an unpleasant reminder of the last time it had made her feel this nauseous.

The source of the stench soon came into view. There was a body lying in one corner of the storage room. It was very obviously busy decaying. Sock stabbed it anyway, just to be sure it wasn’t just a good actor, but actually dead. When Lil came closer to it, she noted that it didn’t to seem to be a coworker of her mom, at least.

The break room was the next one they checked out but it was empty except for the abandoned furniture. And the store itself didn’t look any better.

They stood in the empty store, between the full shelves and listened to the humming of the lights overhead. The realisation didn’t take long to hit home. Her mom wasn’t there. This had officially turned into a supply run instead of the rescue mission she had hoped for.

 

Jojo had noticed the frustration on her face and gave her shoulder a light but reassuring squeeze. “We’ll have more luck next time,” she said, voice soft, before she looked over at Sock and Jon and announced, “Come on, let’s grab some food and get out of here.”

The others agreed and went on to search for the supplies they would need the most. Which mostly consisted of long-lasting food and water.

So Lil went on to help Jojo squeeze as much canned food and as many beverages into their bags as the seams allowed before tearing apart.

Jonathan stayed in the back with them while Sock looked through the store, mostly to make sure they hadn’t overlooked a zombie.

And then there was a noise coming from the front of the store. Not footsteps or the rustling of plastic bags or the occasional thud of an item hitting the floor that resonated through the store. No, this one was different. It was the opening sound of a sliding door.

“Oh shit,” Sock cursed under his breath. He had gotten too close to the entrance and now they knew for sure that no one had locked the store. Jojo and Jon were both staring into the direction of the door… And the zombies outside had noticed it, too.

Sock grabbed his bag and stumbled over to them, back into Jonathan’s direction, but Lil stopped following his movements at that point. The door closed again, made another sound… And the zombies got closer. The crowd in front of the store started to gather in front of the big windows, eyes focused on the sliding door, approaching slowly.

They were only drawn there by the sound, they couldn’t have spotted Sock or else they would have run, they would have been inside already.

 

Her hand let go of her bag when she saw _them_.

 

Emptiness spread in her chest like a weed taking root in fertile soil. It was digging into her heart, spreading through her veins, boring into her flesh. Her body felt heavy, numb and useless, shriveling up like a slug in the merciless arms of the sunlight on a hot and cloudless summer day.

Nothing made sense anymore. Her brain couldn’t fathom it. She couldn’t wrap her mind around the concept. It didn’t make any sense. None at all. It was impossible, simply impossible. A paradox far beyond her understanding.

Those were her parents. It was a mere a fact. Something undeniable. And yet, it couldn’t be. Lil had been so sure, so convinced, that they were still alive.

 

She could still see them smiling, laughing, talking and arguing. She could still remember her father crying when he lost his job. And her mom consoling him, somehow giving him hope again. Lil saw them sitting at the breakfast table, still tired and devoid of any motivation to go to their respective jobs, petting Lawrence Meower who wouldn’t stop screaming for as long as he couldn’t see just what exactly Lil and her parents were doing up there on the table.

Her mom would always pick him up, no matter that dad complained about it each and every time. He didn’t want cat hairs on his food, is what he always said. And yet… he could never resist the soft fur of that fluffy bastard. The hypocrite always ended up petting him.

 

It was impossible. They couldn’t be dead. Lil could still see them, could remember so much about them. It didn’t make sense. They couldn’t just be dead. Past and gone. Her memories couldn’t only be just that. It couldn’t be.

They had to be alive. Or, well, that was what she kept telling herself as the two people who were dearest to her, who had raised her, were sure to come for them.

Lil could already see them stumbling into her direction, in her head, towards Lil and Jojo and their two new companions. They were her parents, her family. And now they were nothing but a shell of their former selves. A threat for her friends. A danger for her new family… A danger for Jonathan, Sock… and Jojo.

 

Lil couldn't move. Her mind screamed at her to run away, fight back, do _something_. But she felt weak, so weak, like there was no use. Her body didn't budge, didn't want to cooperate. She could faintly hear Jojo's voice but she had no idea what she was saying. Her words didn’t reach her mind.

She couldn’t do much, she just imagined her parents getting closer, stumbling towards them. Their hands reached out for them. And in that moment, she was certain. Her parents would kill them.  
Jojo grabbed her shoulders, forced her to look into her eyes. Suddenly, she existed again. She yanked Lil back into reality. “Lil, what’s _wrong_ with you?”

“There-… They, they’re my-” Her voice gave out. Jojo seemed confused, puzzled by her words… until she wasn’t. Her eyes stopped boring into Lil’s. Her head turned, took a look at the the zombies, still outside, but close to the door… and she _saw them_. Lil’s mom in her work clothes, with her name tag too far away to make out, and her father in his suit, including a light blue shirt and dark green tie that screamed of his missing sense for color combinations or fashion in general. And of course she also looked at their eyes, far away but unmistakably filled with hunger. Dead and searching for flesh. Jojo looked back at Lil. Her face was so much paler than before. “Oh god, I-… Lil, I’m so sorry.”

Her voice was filled with pain, more pain than Lil had ever seen on her face. She raised her hands as if she didn’t know what to do with her arms - she dropped them again - and then, she wrapped them around Lil’s shivering body.

Warmth seeped into her body like a flame coming to life. When had she started to shake? Why was it so cold? Lil returned the hug, arms wrapping around Jojo’s back. She searched for the warmth, gave in to the comfort of her touch, eyes stinging with tears, pressing into Jojo’s shoulder, leaving wet spots on her already dirty shirt. When had she started to cry? She hadn’t even noticed.

 

She was pressed up against her body, giving in to the safety and warmth it promised and even tho she made everything more bearable, the pain didn't ease at all, it didn't go away. It was still there and burning through her chest, destroying everything in its path. Precious memories, joy and love. Everything felt numb and dead.

She barely took notice of Sock and Jon gathering their bags and some more items in a hurry. They weren’t done yet when the first zombie came close enough to the sliding doors for them to open.

After that, everything happened too fast. Jojo let go of her, watching the zombies she had previously managed to distract with her well-placed throws pour into the store. The horror in her voice was hard to miss when she told Lil to stay back.

But her eyes couldn’t really focus. She couldn’t stop staring at her parents. They came into the store and they looked so _weird_ , so _wrong._

The zombies came for Sock and Jonathan, first. They were closer to the doors. She could see her mother standing right next to him, barely taller but still hovering over Sock like a wolf over an unsuspecting sheep. Lil couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe.

Sock’s knife met her mom’s head in one second and during the next one Jojo walked right into Lil, wildly swinging at a dead woman while Lil’s father closed in on them.

 

Her body started to move on its own. The next thing she knew was that she could feel the handle of her knife in her hand before it met her father’s shoulder, his chest and then his eye when he tried to reach for Lil. He was still twitching when Lil came back to her senses and stumbled backwards into Jojo, who carried the bag in her arms that Lil had dropped.

Sock and Jonathan came running over to them, leaving behind the dead bodies of the zombies that had attacked them. Sock almost tripped over her dad’s arm that moved to grab Sock’s leg and he gave him the finishing blow, killing him for good.

Lil couldn’t grasp what had just happened. She still stood there, staring at the bloodied work clothes she had seen countless times before, but not like that. And then Jojo grabbed her arm and pulled her out of the room that even more zombies had started to pour into.

They ran through the storage room, out of the open door and back into the alleyway outside, where Jonathan shut the metal door and Sock told them to follow him as he and the others ran across the now almost empty street and away from the zombie-filled 7-Eleven.

They didn’t stop running until Sock deemed the street to be ‘safe enough’ and all of them were out of breath.

 

***

 

She couldn’t hold it in anymore when they reached the safe shelter Sock’s basement gave them.

Lil was overflowing. She only made a few steps inside and instantly deflated, her chest was aching. She felt like she was going to combust, like everything was going to break out of her. She was going to overflow, her chest was going to explode into a gory mess.

Everything just wanted out, _out of her, out of her body, out of her heart, just…_ away.

Away from her, from her body, from her mind, from her thoughts. Away from this place, from the memories, from the past, from the pictures in her head of her mom and dad being dead, walking, and not dead at all at the same time. And then they were really dead, like… actually dead, not undead but… unmoving and dead and gone and covered in blood.

And now it was over and yet it wasn’t, it didn’t feel like it was over, it couldn’t be over, it just couldn’t be. It didn’t feel like anything at all. It was as if she was still sleeping, as though she had never woken up on the first day when it all started. It was as if she was still dreaming. And god, it was the most horrible nightmare she had ever had.

 

Tears were clouding her vision now, they just started spilling and spilling, running down her face and she couldn’t stop them. She couldn’t control it, couldn’t hold any of it back. She was overflowing and now it all spilled and she felt like she couldn’t stop crying ever again.

She was sobbing, every breath hurt and yet she kept gasping and wailing and before she knew it, someone was holding her.

Jojo had pulled her into a tight embrace again. There was warmth around her but it didn’t calm her. Lil clung to her like a drowning child holding onto a piece of driftwood, but she knew Jojo couldn’t save her. It had all gone to shit.

Jonathan looked like he was sick, like he was about to puke any minute now, like he couldn’t take any more of this violence and killing and death.

But Sock? He was different. He didn’t look shaken. Not at all. It seemed like this was exactly what he was always supposed to do. Like he was born for this. For the fight, for the knife in his hand separating flesh from bones, for cutting and hurting and killing. This was his element.

 

But it wasn’t Lil’s. She couldn’t smile on and act like nothing had happened. She felt so numb, so weird. Like none of this had been real.  
  
Like her parents were still alive, sitting at their kitchen table and just waiting for Lil to wake up and greet them with a smile.


	6. Not the End, Just the Beginning

Jojo felt like she was going crazy. Slowly, but surely.

Lil hadn’t talked to her for the past couple of days. She actually hadn’t talked  _ at all _ , not since the incident in the 7-Eleven. She had been staring instead. And she’d done so a lot. Staring at the walls, at the floor, at the ceiling… but she didn’t look at Jojo any more. Their eyes hadn’t met a single time since she had lead Lil all the way back to Sock’s basement.

She slowly felt herself forget what her voice sounded like, and what  _ her smile  _ looked like… It felt like a distant memory. It couldn’t have been longer than a week since she had seen it for the first time. It was so honest and real when she had talked about her cat with the ridiculous name. Jojo still knew that her smile had spread over her entire face, grin wide and eyes crinkling.

And now it was gone, swiped away and replaced with a blank, unreadable expression.

She missed the real Lil. She missed the kind but stubborn girl who had gone along with her crazy plan, who had offered to help her search for Jojo’s dad and then went on to befriend the only person on this goddamn planet Jojo didn’t want to see… who she was now forced to endure every single day. It was harder now, not talking to him. Now that Lil was so agonizingly silent. Sock hadn’t done anything particularly suspicious but that didn’t mean that Jojo didn’t keep an eye on him.

She still wouldn’t trust Sock farther than she could throw him, but that was a given. Not after what had happened to Sparks.

But she would suffer through the life in his basement. She would just have to suppress as many unpleasant memories as possible… and try to keep her sanity, since she couldn’t take Lil away from here the way she was now. And well, she had to admit that Lil had at least been right about Jonathan. He was a decent guy and didn’t bother her too much.

God, it was still crazy, thinking how different everything could be at that very moment hadn’t she come by Lil in the hallway on the first day. She had to admit that she… totally acted without thinking when she saw Lil being attacked. She had basically just given up and was on her way to an exit shortly before she had spotted her. It was silly, really. But… if it weren’t for the little crush she had developed on the purple haired girl whose name she didn’t even know at that point… she might have never noticed her in the middle of all the chaos.

And now that she knew Lil, she considered her a friend and might have even… still had that little crush on her. But now she looked so hurt,  _ so broken _ , and it shattered Jojo’s heart into a million pieces. Was she being selfish when she just wanted to see her happy, to see her smile again?

  
  


***

 

Jojo looked like she wanted to say something, but Lil couldn’t muster the strength to ask. Not that she actually knew what to say. She hadn’t talked to her in… a good while. And she wasn’t too proud of it.

And, well… she might have also avoided talking to the others. She didn’t want to ignore them or anything, but… She felt so tired. Her body felt like it was made of stone, heavy and barely alive.

Sock’s well-meaning words hadn’t done much more than piss her off the days before. She knew that he had been through almost the same things, but… she hadn’t wanted to hear any of it. She had felt like he clearly couldn’t understand her at all, like he had no idea what she was trying to overcome, what she was trying to live through… But she had been wrong, wrong and foolish and stupid.

She had yelled at him to shut up, to leave her alone. She had yelled at him when he clearly tried to cheer her up.

She had looked at Jonathan like she would strangle him as soon as he only looked at her. And then, later, she started to act like both him and Sock weren’t even there.

Fuck, she hadn’t even listened to Jojo, hadn’t accepted her expression of condolences, she didn’t want to listen to any of it. All of that made it feel too real, like her parents were actually dead, like they were gone forever.

 

Which they were.

 

And it wasn’t Jonathan’s or Jojo’s fault, it wasn’t Sock’s fault, either, it wasn’t even her own fault. It weren’t even the zombies, the people that had turned into monsters against their will. The cause of the outbreak was what had killed her parents. Whatever or whoever had caused this mess was responsible for the misery they were all in. Nothing or no one else was at fault. Only that.

And Lil knew that. She had been thinking for a while, had gone in circles and lain awake and came to that conclusion. No matter how horrible she felt, no matter how often she was reminded of the bloodied knife in her hand, the bodies lying on the floor, dead and motionless… it wasn’t her fault. They were already dead when they had gotten there. They had already been dead long before Lil arrived at the store, maybe even before she and Jojo had met Sock and Jon.

Lil had to stop punishing herself for having hope. She had to stop beating herself up for thinking that her parents might have survived, might have been as alive and well as herself.

And she needed to start talking to the others again. She had to look at them again, recognise them as the friends they were and finally show them that she knew they were all going through hell at the moment. Sock had lost his family just like she had. Jojo and Jonathan still didn’t know anything about their own families and friends, they had to be suffering as much as Lil had been.

She had to let them know that she understood their anxiety, their fears. Especially now that they had seen how easily all hope could be lost. Lil couldn’t help but shake her head. Fuck, she really hadn’t been acting like herself. She hadn’t been fair. Not to herself and not to her friends.

She still wanted to help Jojo search for her dad. She knew she couldn’t let this happen to Jojo, too. She didn’t want her to lose anyone. Not like Lil had just done. She had to help Jojo, just like Jojo had helped her.

“Jojo?” Her throat felt dry and scratchy. She felt like she hadn’t talked for centuries.

Jojo started and turned her head towards Lil, but Lil couldn’t bear to look at her. God, was she embarrassed of herself.

“I-... I’m really sorry,” Lil mumbled. ‘And ashamed’, she added in her thoughts. 

“I… I’ve been acting really,” she searched for the right words and almost said ‘like a bitch’ instead, “really unfair, I… I’m sorry for...” God, why was this so hard? “I’m sorry for ignoring you, you were just trying to help but I didn’t want to see that.” Lil was still looking away, staring at the floor, looking at anything but the girl in front of her.

She really wouldn’t blame her if Jojo was mad at her, if she would yell at her or ignore her like Lil had done to her… But none of that happened. Instead, Jojo’s entire face lit up when her eyes met Lil’s.

She knew nothing about Jojo, in a way. She knew nothing, but everything she needed to at the same time.

The world may have been horrible and hard and nothing in life seemed fair or just…

But they would be there for each other. And they would have each other’s back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed reading my first w2h fanfic <3 I would really appreciate any kind of comment on this, even reports of a missing/unneeded comma (et cetera)!
> 
> And of course a huge Thank You to the amazing artists who did some great art for this fic:  
> \- Check out the Animatic by LucaRosaLafur (on instagram) aka Luca LaFaire (on Youtube) [HERE](https://youtu.be/5eRo24hV_gg)  
> \- Check out fireweep's art pieces [HERE](https://www.instagram.com/p/Bl6DuPchrto/?utm_source=ig_share_sheet&igshid=rpsbzeb01n2y)


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